Does higher difficulty mean more XP?

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Hi everyone!

I'm not exactly new, i had an account which i made sometime in 2002 i believe... but i can't remember the username and the mail i made it on is dead.

Anyway, that doesn't matter.

I've recently started playing BGII - i meant so many times to play it, especially that i love AD&D games and have finished almost every great title from 2001 till today, with the exception of IWD 1 which i started though, but left it at chapter 3 i believe and ToEE which was a little bit borring.


To be honest, i don't know why i haven't started playing BGII up until now... But this doesn't matter, i mean better late than never.
Anyway it is exactly how everyone told me it would be. And that is great!

Enough chit-chat.

In BGII does increasing the difficulty give you more XP per kills (i don't expect per quest...)?

BTW, i'm playing a mage and i have Korgan, Valygar, Minsc, Viconia and Jaheira. Is this ballanced enough? Is it a reasonable combination?

 

IIrc it doesn't. It just makes the enemies do 50% (or somesuch) more damage.

Your party is balanced enough; dunno if there'll be any conflicts with the charactes, but in terms of balanced you should have it covered (seeing as you fill in on the arcane part yourself). You may want a mage more if/when you're planning to take on ToB too.

 

It's a good party. You've got Korgan and Minsc as tanks, you as a mage, 2 priests, and Valygar for sniping, scouting and generally filling other roles. If you've not already started getting annoyed at the lack of good thieving skills, then you'll probably do without them until the end. I usually find I cannot play SoA without one NPC that's at least part thief, but I suppose it is feasible.

 

Welcome to the club, pal!

You will really enjoy BG2, I can tell you! Then you should definitely get ToB too!

Anyway, your party is decent, really. Viccy and Jaheira will soon start a nasty cat-fight if your PC is a male and tries to romance bot though.

And no, harder settings do not give more XP, it does in IWD with HoW installed IIRC.

 

Thanks for the welcome Silverstar. I already have ToB installed, i bought them both ofcourse. You can't really have one without the other.
Viccy and Jaheira, heh? Well it's curious cause Jaheira hasn't made a move yet.

And Ziad, thanks, i also use Valygar as a tank most times and he ripps apart everything. I've got an offhand weapon. Sure he has crappy THAC0 for offhand but he's got -3 AC and he rarely gets hit. Korgan and Minsc just tear apart through the ranks. And then i have my mage with Robe of Vecna that finishes everything off almost instantly. Jaheira is pretty good despite what i've seen. Shapeshifting is usless though. At least she has Ironskins and Insect Plague which is godsend. And besides that i just "got" Summon Fire Elem. and it is just kick-ass especially when i Haste it.
Viconia is really nice. I have A +3 Sling ATM and some really nice bullets and she has THAC0 6 if i'm not mistaken. And that is without Righteous Magic, Holy Power etc etc. She is good. I've got her mainly because she was "recommended" by a friend. And Besides that i've seen the new spells that clerics have in ToB. Overkill. And Viccy seems pretty cool besides...

 

Just wait till you find the Celestial Fury katana (in a guarded warehouse in the Temple District).

@Silverstar: only when you enable the Heart of Fury option.

 

Well met MindBlank. I will add my voice to others in agreeing that increasing the difficulty only makes enemies do more damage to you, but XP earned is not commensurate with the added challenge.

However, I do not agree with others that say you can easily go through the entire game without a thief. On one hand, technically they are correct. There are very few instances where a trap is going to insta-gib one of your characters. Most of the time if you just run a character through a trapped area, they take some damage but don't die. On the other hand, your thief can disarm these traps, reducing damage, open locks to give you access to what's inside (and can do so much more effectively that attempting to bash the lock open) and also earns a decent amount of experience points for performing these tasks. As thieves increase in level they earn more experience for these tasks too. The minimums are 400 XP for picking a lock and 950 XP for disarming a trap, and they go up from there. While that's not a huge XP reward, let's just say that there are so many traps and locks in BG2, that if you added up all the XP your thief earned in this way, you'd have a whole bunch of XPs!

 

You've got a decent party, just try and keep your reputation average so that nobody leaves. Personally I'm inclined to agree with Aldeth; not having anyone with thieving skills can be frustrating, especially on your first playthrough. If you really wanted a thief, I'd get rid of Valygar and take Jan, since you've already got two and a half more-than-adequate fighters in the form of Minsc, Korgan and Jaheira. Jan'll give you a bit of extra arcane, too. Or you could opt for Yoshimo, since he's got a bit of backstory with the main plot, and you'll eventually be able to replace him with Imoen.

 

@Aldeth: I totally agree; especially the Swashbucklers kick some serious ass.
The only disadvantage: no backstabbing multiplier
The benefits:

He even forgot to mention that they can specialize in a weapon. (unlike ordinary thiefs)
Grand Mastery is fun, but the extra bonuses are neglectable. (moreover, I don't like spending 5+ on a weapon, because you're almost forced to stick with it for the rest of your game)

A fighter with thieving skills = winnar
With a Belt of *** Giant Strength, he's unstoppable at higher levels. (just like a Monk)

FYI, here's the amount of XP you receive for disarming traps and picking locks

lvl 1-5: 250 1000

lvl 6-10: 400 1750

lvl 11-15: 950 2750

lvl 16-40: 1550 3250

 

Oh, right. I forgot to mention that the minimums can go below 400/950 if you have a thief of lower than level 6. The only way this will ever happen though is if you happen to dual class to a thief from another class. Even a brand new F/M/T created at the beginning of SoA will already have enough experience to be 6th level. Besides, you'll get enough experience to surpass those first 5 levels soon enough. In fact, you'll even get to the 950/2750 very quickly. The 1550/3250 level can take a while, especially if you are multi-classed.

 

Swashies aren't all that. The price you're paying for that AC bonus is lower HP, higher THAC0, one less attack per round and no backstab. Might as well go with a fighter/thief.

 

Of course a fighter/thief will be a better warrior, but he won't have decent thieving skills.
Btw, if you specialize in Scimitar and use Belm +2 and Scarlet Ninja-To +3 (requires Use Any Item though), you will have 3 or 4 attacks per round. (don't remember the exact number)
Kundane +2 (a short sword) does the trick as well.
I just meant to say Swashbucklers are way better than ordinary thiefs. (unless you backstab frequently)

 

If you dual wield Belm or Kundane and the Scarlet Ninja-to, you'll have four and a half attacks per round with specialisation. But you'll do relatively crappy damage with all of them, because none of those weapons are very good outside of their bonus attack.

But yeah, swashies are better than pure thieves. Most things are better than pure thieves, though - they're far better suited to a dual or multiclass. Anyway, I guess this is kind of academic, since the guy's already built his protagonist and there aren't any swashbucklers or fighter/thieves among the available NPCs.